De Profundis
by Teagie227
Summary: On the way to the Daystrom institute for further study, Lore's remains go missing on the Enterprise. And when an unlikely team arrive aboard the Enterprise, it becomes paramount that he is found. Bleh. Bad summary. ALTERNATE TIMELINE. OC warning. Please read AN. Pretty please? Oh, yeah, and review w/ constructive criticism if you want!
1. Chapter 1

**I tried to make this story as canon freindly as I could with the alternate timeline and all that. Sorry if there's something wrong, I'm not an expert, but I hope it's not bad! Review if you feel like it!**

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"Now, Mirigh, when we get inside remember to put on your best smiles so you may distract the spacemen." Tarwtak placed a hand on his young daughter's shoulder and felt her tense. Ah, Girls. He would never understand them.

"Yes, father." She said tightly, looking around the half-broken down Klingon ship her people lived on. It would not be long before they had to steal another on, and she played with a loose coil on the wall and waited for an answer to her people's hailing frequency. This ship would be easy, or so she would assume. They were parked above a particularly beautiful planet and it was not uncommon for Starships to go on leave. There would be a skeleton crew at least aboard but what they were really counting on was most of the crew being down on the surface.

The channel was opened and before them appeared an older human male, bald, with a sharp facial structure, and looking slightly confused in a well-veiled, put-off, sort of way. It was difficult to pick up on, but these people had a lifetime of needing to read people.

"You're not Klingons." He stated as a simple matter of fact, and his demeanor seemed to demand an explaination without actually asking for one. Tarwtak smiled brightly.

"No, we are not Klingons, we are travelers looking to make a few credits. We wondered if you were wanting for any entertainment this fine star date." The man shifted a little, and whispered a few exchanges with another officer before saying,

"Thank you for asking but I'm afraid we'll have to decline."

"Are you sure Captain?" He held his hands out, palms facing outwards. It was easier to make people trust when appearing as non-threatening as possible.

"Yes, most definitely." And the link was brought to an abrupt end. Captain Picard quickly checked the time and promptly left the bridge to Commander Worf, of all people. He was the only one of the crew who'd requested _not_ to take the day. Afterall, he had no real reason to celebrate today's tradition. Picard put a little bounce in his step on the way to Dr. Crusher's quarters, after all, this had always been his favorite day of the year since childhood. So, as was natural, he went to the Crusher residence and toatsed to Christmas. No matter how time passed in Space, Christmas was a constant.

"Captain, you're late." Beverlystated in a light-hearted fashion.

"I had a matter to attend to. Couple of 'entertainers' they called themselves. Normally I may have allowed them on with restrictions, but all the signs pointed to Space Gypsys, or pirates."

"Oh, dear, you did tell them to leave, didn't you?" She asked, slightly alarmed and veiling it for the good of the other attendants.

Thinking back on it, he hadn't, actually. Nevertheless, he told her he had.

And whilst the good Captain was claiming to have kicked the gypsys out of his sight, Imhotep and Dmitri, the "greatest father-son recon team in history", slinked through the hallways of the Enterprise, undectected. They had devices that could veil their energy signatures so as not to be detected by most sensors, and Dmitri looked around, amazed at the sheer _cleanliness_ of everything, having lived most of his life in a rusty Klingon warship. He had never seen so much white. Through all of this, though, he was less than impressed with the security. Sure, the ship detected their vessel within an whole parsec, but,

"What the Hell kind of spaceship is this that doesn't have cameras?"

Imhotep looked down a hallway in each direction, making sure the coast was clear, and grabbing his son's hand, sprinted across it. "Now, Dmitri, don't use that kind of language, you know how mother hates hearing it." He scolded.

"But why can I not use such language if I wish? I am 12 years and 10 months old. I am almost a man!" He said defiantly.

Imhotep sighed, the boy had much to learn about life. Now was the opportunity for a new lesson, "Ah, my dear boy. You must understand, to mothers, you are not a man until you grow old and die of senility."

Dmitri simply walked with his father down the empty hallway, nodding slowly as if contemplating a new and complicated scientific theory. Smiling that the boy understood, Imhotep came across a door prominently labeled, "Science Equipment" and said to his young son,

"Well, this looks like it's filled with lots of expensive and valuable things.. Let's go inside. Now, my son, there is most assuredly someone inside, when we go in, I want you to find them as quick as you can, and... neutralize them before they can sound an alarm. Okay?"

Dmitri nodded.

Imhotep, however was unsure how to enter, he crouched down by the side of it, back to the wall, and attempted to pry it open with his fingers, he wanted to be stealthy, after all. But the door wouldn't budge. He looked around for a control panel and there was none. Finally, he simply stood up before it and wondered, _How the hell do I make it open? _And of course as soon as he just stood before it, the door glided open and he jerked back momentarily, then nodded to his son and went in. Imhotep ignored all the, "Excuse me, who are you?"'s from the young lady who was 'standing guard', and turned a deaf ear to the loud thud he heard when Dmitri 'nuetralized' her in whatever way he saw fit, and they searched the whole office.

Many of the devices were far too big to be beamed back, and the rest weren't impotant enough. Finally, Imhotep checked the pulse of the woman to make sure she was living and said, "Looks like this room is a bust, let's get to the next one." He couldn't see Dmitri anywhere, but he could her the boy rustling about before he called out,

"Wait, father, I may have found something! Come see!" Excitement laced between Dmitri's words as he pleaded for his father to come look.

Imhotep followed the sound of his son's voice to a small, half-hidden, storage room which was rather poorly lit. But inside, there was something... outrageous, remarkable, and Imhotep contacted Tarwtak and said, "Tarwtak? Get us out of here. We may have found something... priceless."

Tarwtak fiddled with the transporter buttons and the father-son team appeared before them holding a manican-like body, all parts disassembled. Tarwtak stared at them indifferently. "You found a manican? I hope for your sake it's made of diamonds."

"No, look." Imhotep motioned Tarwtak to come closer, and, obliging, he saw the internal mechanisms of the object and raised his eyebrows in surprise. Mirigh leaned over her father's shoulder on her toes, craning her neck to see.

"What do you think it is?" Tarwtak asked.

Imhotep was silent for a moment and then eventually leaned in close to his friend, and said quietly, "It looks like an Andrio-"

"I know that! I mean, what do you think it's function is?"

This time no one had a smart-ass answer.

"Well, I suppose there are ways of telling." Tarwtak dismissed. "Girl!" He addressed his daughter. "How far away are we from Terra Cotta III?"

She went over to the display screen and punch in a few commands. So little of her people could actually use it "A couple of hours." She said.

"Good. I know a guy on that planet. No degree, but a genius. I think it's time we pay him a freindly visit, yes?" He clutched Imhotep's shoulder and smiled reassuringly. Imhotep nodded and led his young son away.

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The Enterprise was nearing the location of the Daystrom Institute, prepared to drop off Lore's remains. A representative was beamed aboard the ship, and waited patiently, carrying case in hand, for some ensigns to fetch the parts. _How exciting, _he thought, _The students will finally get to study a real life Soong-type Android._ Yet, despite his excitement, it was taking longer than expected. He checked his watch. Twenty minutes, they were literally thirty meters from the storage units, what was taking so long? He walked out of the room where he had waited so patiently, and peeked out, face almost running straight into a somewhat panicked-looking Captain Picard.

"What is the problem, Captain?"

"Sir, I am very sorry to say this, but... We can't seem to find Lore anywhere on the ship."

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**Thanks for reading! Hope you liked it!**


	2. Chapter 2

Gideon Pryce looked upon his yard, littered with travellers. It was only a matter of time until the neighbors began complaining. He turned back from his window to look at Tarwtak and his merry band of group leaders, standing about and looking quite uncomfortable. Imhotep shifted where he stood.

"So, what brings you and your brigade to my humble abode, Tarwtak? If I know you as well as I'd like to assume, I know that you aren't here for my razor-sharp wit." He raised an eyebrow. He was a tall man, in his late thirties, with dusty brown hair and an anemic look to him, as if he hadn't slept in days. But beneath all the dry humor he was lively enough.

"Precisely. We... we may have found something that would interest you, Doctor." Tarwtak nodded to Imhotep, and his friend promptly fetched the dismantled android, walking back into the house, juggling an entire body in his arms, and lay them out on the floor.

Dr. Gideon looked down at it, seemingly interested and told Imhotep to back away and let him have a look. Adjusting his bifocals, he poked and prodded at the body parts, and said, very quietly, "My God..."

Tarwtak got riled up a bit and said with excitement, "What? What is it?" Mirigh stood up on her tiptoes to catch a glimpse, thinking maybe there was a time-bomb wired into the thing from the way Dr. Pryce was speaking.

"This, what you have here, is a Soong-type android, it's a remarkably incredible automaton, capable of many thing and... where did you get this?" Gideon looked up from his floor, stammering his words, full of surprise.

"Nowhere you need be concerned about. Can you do anything?" Tarwtak asked, and immediately backed off, not wanting to seem too eager. "I mean, by the way you're talking about this, it could be worth our while to have him functioning. I'd give anything, really."

"Maybe, if I had time. How long can you stay?"

"As long as we need to, I suppose."

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Weeks passed by before Gideon could even properly connect the dismantled android. And the mysteries of his functions were just as puzzling to the Gypsys and Gideon as was the mystery of where Lore could be to the Enterprise crew. They had yet to find anything but a sliver of trace radiation and the eyewitness account of the guard to even indicate that the Gypsys were even there in the first place. Data had been asked countless times if he knew where Lore could be and to be honest, even he had no idea. Where Lore was, that was where the Gypsys put him. And Data knew the Gypsys even less than his brother, who still seemed somewhat of an anomaly to him, with all of the emotional complexities.

So, after the first week of nothing, they had ultimately decided to continue work as usual, though keeping a firm eye out for the beat up old Klingon ship, or any signs of inexplicable outbursts of violence that would inevitably follow Lore's presence. But no violence came. There was nothing for a whole month. Lore hadn't yet been reactivated, you see. It took any cyberneticist who wasn't Dr. Soong a lot more time to reactivate an Soong android then it would have taken Dr. Soong himself to make a new one, now that the basic ground work for one had been laid out.

And while Dr. Pryce was slaving away, hovering over Lore's body, haphazardly strewn across the floor, Tarwtak came into the house and observed him for a moment.

"Doctor." Tarwtak stepped into the room further, taking care not to step on anything of value. "I believe it's time we discuss your form of payment, the assemblage of this android is much more important to me than anything I can give you, I swear."

Gideon paused from his work, "What were you thinking of offering me?"

"Anything you want, within reason, of course."

Dr. Pryce turned back to his work and said passively, "I wouldn't mind having a wife around. I'm growing tired of solitude." He knew that, to Tarwtak's people, marriage was not quite so much an emotional commitment as it was an advantageous status.

"You could have my daughter." Tarwtak offered, and a bit too quickly for Gideon to appreciate. "She is the only woman I have of appropriate marrying age. We do not have as many women as we did last time I saw you."

Thus fact led Gideon to believe Tarwtak must make these sort of deals often. "I could not take your daughter from you, sir. You are sure there aren't any others?"

"Unless you would like to take my own widowed mother." Tarwtak said, smirking slightly, knowing Gideon would take his initial offer. He was, in fact, quite ready to be rid of his daughter. She was almost twenty-two. It was time for her to have her own life. And Gideon was a good man, Tarwtak thought. He would make her a good husband. God, was he a good matchmaker.

Gideon shrugged. "Very well, then."

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Data looked over the reports he'd received once more to make sure he hadn't misread them before addressing the problem to Captain Picard.

"Captain," He addressed. "Starfleet is receiving a remarkable number of reports of a Klingon ship, 20 or more years old, docking in places it has no reason to be, within our sector."

"That could most likely be the thieves who took Lore's parts from our ship, Captain." Worf growled. Of all the members of the crew, Worf had taken it the worst, understandably. As chief of security, it was his job to make sure this sort of thing didn't happen. And he had spent the last few weeks in a bad row due to his "failure". Naturally, he had more motivation to catch the Gypsys than anyone else on the ships.

"That is very likely, Commander," Picard acknowledged. "I believe it is worth looking into. Data, where was the ship last reported?"

"An Earth-like inhabited planet called Terra Cotta III."

"Set a course for Terra Cotta III, warp 7. Engage."

The ship's warp core whirred into action, and straight to Terra Cotta III they went.

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Olivia coaxed the ship out of it's last throes of shock from the dimensional leap. The ship was beat up, and Olivia was pretty sure her daughter had been knocked unconscious, but they were alive, the leap had worked, and the ship was okay.

"Elias, are you all right?" She called back to her Ardroxian husband, who grunted a bit. "And Marina?"

"I'm fine, mom." The woman said from her place next to her father, out of Olivia's line of sight. She rubbed the back of her head to dull the pain of the ship's hull trying to crush her skull. Okay, maybe she was being a little melodramatic, but she grumbled, "God damnit, mom." under her breath all the same.

"You sure you're okay?" Elias asked, concerned.

"I'm fine, thanks. Mom! How close are we?" Excitement laced through Marina's voice.

"If we ended up where we need to be, we should be straight in the path of our dear Captain in about 30 minutes."

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**Thanks for reading! You'll get some Lore next chapter I promise!**


	3. Chapter 3

Lore came to in the middle of the night. It was unexpected, yes, for everyone. But he was left, opened up, in the middle of Dr. Gideon's living room floor, in the darkness of midnight. He sat straight up and messed around with the sensors and tools attached to his inner mechanisms and closed himself off. He stood, slowly, taking care not to make much noise, and had a walk about. He saw a small house, hardly worth his time, some random man crashed on the couch. Lore opened and closed the door with impeccable grace, barely making a noise, and came out into a yard filled with about tweny-five or so people, all asleep, and, much to Lore's excitement, a ship. Not just any ship, a war ship. He relaxed a little with relief. There was a way off this rock. He could get well into space and figure out where he was. He could figure out what his next move would be.

He wondered, as he crossed the yard, tip-toeing around the sleeping Gypsys, strewn haphazardly across the grass, if the Federation knew he was missing, and more importantly if they knew where he was. Obviously he had been taken off the ship, or out of a building, something. He had to have been stolen. Data wouldn't just drop him off at a random location and hope no one knew how reassemble and reactivate him. That's not the way his brother did things. Data would have made doubly sure Lore stayed incapacitated. That he knew.

Finally Lore reached the inside of the ship. Now that he had a closer look at it, he could see it was Klingon. But old. Very old. He maneuvered his way through and reached the control panel. Punching around on the controls a bit, the machine whirred to life. He could fly just about anything, and this was no difference. Normally, he would have tried to escape quietly, but keeping a Klingon ship quiet might as well be impossible. So instead, he punched it, and left the Gypsys in the dust.

Maybe he could have used them for some sort of benefit, but these fleshlings weren't worth his time trying to squash them like the bugs they were. Besides, he assumed they had reactivated him, so he owed them their lives, at least. Even if they were stuck on the marble.

He reached close orbit and checked the stars, maps, radars, anything, to realize that he was far away from the rest of the galaxy. He wasn't even close to, well, anything. It would take at least 6 hours to get anywhere important even at warp 9. And warp 9 would definitely rattle this ship into oblivion. It was too rusty. This was going to be a long wait. He took a seat and watched the stars stretch around him.

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Mirigh woke to the ship shaking from its very shook the sleep away from her thoughts. She thought she was the only one on board tonight. Why was the ship running? Why were her people moving? She was supposed to be joined with Gideon tomorrow. Did they con him? No, that wouldn't be a very good move. Gideon had connections. He could easily track them down. Finally she managed to stand and began to make her way to the control room, wondering why no one was roaming around the ship like usual. Something was very wrong.

Slowly, she peeked around the corner and saw the android. Lore heard her come, and turned. She saw him turn and gasped, he got a good veiw of her face and visibly jumped a little. It took one half-second for him to compose himself, wondering what he could possibly say in this situation.

"What are you doing on this ship?" He finally asked.

"I live here, I was going to ask you..."

He thought about killing her.

"So, you're the android..."

It would be easy.

"Yeah, the android." He said simply. She stood across the room from him, and when he stood she half-way leapt to the door, seemingly sensing the bad vibes he was almost certainly giving off. "Who are you?"

"I'm no one, who are you?" She asked slowly.

He didn't say anything.

"That's okay. You don't have to tell me. You can be no one two. Are you going to kill me?"

"What makes you think that?"

"You did just steal a ship."

"So did you. Are you a killer?"

She kept quiet and stepped forward a little, expression changing from horror to wonder, yet still guarded. She came closer to him than he was sure anyone else could have.

"You look so real."

"I am real."

She began to reach out, and thought better of it. "Can I..."

Lore rolled his eyes and turned away.

"You'll forgive me if I ask what may seem a very personal question but, why did you jump when you saw me?"

He should just remain silent, but for once in his life, he was tired of being the bad guy. What was one confession? "You... remind me of someone."

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**Bleh. Short, I know. Sorry this chapter was such a long time coming, and the next one will take even longer because I'm going to camp (Don't hurt me).**

**Thanks for reading!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Well, it is 3 am and I can not sleep. This benefits you, dear readers because what do I do when I can't sleep? I write a thing.**

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Her name was Miranda and she was, arguably, the only real friend Lore had ever made. He made it very clear that he didn't want to be anyone's friend. He decided on an escape plan long ago, and when everyone's back was turned, he was sure to strike. He'd heard of something called the crystalline entity. Nothing straightforward, but he heard whispers on the grapevine, and it echoed through the part of his processor that contained the memories of enyone he'd ever met on this forsaken colony.

So he was sure to kill everyone on this planet. But Miranda just sort of... started speaking to him one day. She had asked him if he knew Intergalactic Sign Language. He replied that yes, he did, and she nodded and turned away. Every day after that she would say hello to him, ask him how he was and eventually she grew on him. And this girl that stood before him, she was like a photocopy of the original. Same heght, similiar weight, green eyes, auburn hair.

So for purely sentimental purposes, he was civil.

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"Sir, they're hailing us." Data called to the back of the bridge.

Picard almost sighed. He didn't have time for this. They needed to find Lore before he blew up a galaxy or something and this unidentified craft just came out of nowhere and _would not budge for anything. _At least it wasn't shooting phasers at his ship. He swallowed all the annoyance and said, "On screen."

On the screen a woman appeared, fair skin, blonde hair, and impossibly large grey-blue eyes. "Well, hello." She drawled suddenly in a very vague Basque accent.

"Ma'am I'm very sorry but we are on a mission and cannot deal with formalities right now I'm going to have to ask you to move aside." There. Quick. Polite. To the point. But no, of course that would never have worked.

"What? Not even for your own daughter?"

The whole bridge turned directly to him. He could feel all the eyes on him, all asking the same question, repeating and evolving into a mantra.

Olivia, on the other side of the screen, just smirked and said, "Knew that'd get your attention. My family and I are ready to beam on board whenever you are."

And Jean-Luc Picard was struck dumb.

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_Why do the villagers hate you so much? _Miranda caught up with Lore after a good taunting, he'd been called a whole slew of nasty things and even she knew.

_Because I'm different. _He replied and crossed his arms, hoping to withdraw enough that she would stop speaking to him.

_I'm different, too, you know. They don't hate me._

Hell, this girl could not take a hint.

_Yes, they do._

Miranda furrowed her brow. _What?_

_They do. They are just WAY less up front about it with you._

_Oh, really? And why's that?_

_They hate me because I am more perfect than them. They hate you because you are less perfect than them but most of them would feel too bad to say it to your face. That's the big difference between you and me. A conscience can do weird things to a human._

Miranda just looked away and nodded, looking very thoughtful for a minute before turning back to him, _At any rate, we're both outcasts. Want to get out of here? I could do with getting out of this city._

Reluctantly, Lore agreed, and Mirand lead him to a small town just on the outskirts of the colony. In fact, it was only a few minutes' walk from his house. It was a pretty little pond, and most of the time spent there was spent in total silence. Sometimes, if he got too annoyed that he'd let some human drag him there he could almost close his eyes and pretend she didn't exist.

And then he heard her shift in the grass, and opening his eyes he saw her rising up, in doing so she lightly patted his hand and said, _I have to go._

_Ok, bye._ He waved her off, and she smiled lightly before taking off in the direction of the road, and he stayed there for about another hour, trying to compute how many blades of grass there were in this area. It was mundane, it was boring, but there wasn't anything else to do. And Lore was a very restless person. He'd do anything, anything at all, not to feel the sensation of boredom. Curse his father for installing it in the first place.

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**Bleh, I think it's okay for now. I'll come back and fix and add later, maybe.**


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